Acoustic Phonetics

1. Acoustic Phonetics How speech sounds are physically represented Chapters 12 and 13

2. Sound • Energy • Travels through a medium to reach the ear • Compression waves Information from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Making Waves: An Overview of Sound.” 2013.

3. Periodic waves • Simple (sine; sinusoid) • Complex (actually a composite of many overlapping simple waves)

4. Sinusoid waves • Simple periodic motion from perfectly oscillating bodies • Found in in nature (e.g., swinging pendulum, sidewinder snake trail, airflow when you whistle) • Sinusoids sound ‘cold’ (e.g. flute)

5. Let’s crank one out! Pg. 175

6. Frequency - Tones

7. Simple waves - key properties • Frequency = cycles per sec (cps) = Hz • Amplitude – measured in decibels (dB), 1/10 of a Bell (Note: dB is on a log scale, increases by powers of 10)

8. Phase • A measure of the position along the sinusoidal vibration • These two waveforms are slightly out of phase (approx. 900 difference) • Used in sound localization

9. Damping • Loss of vibration due to friction

10. Quickie Quiz! Q: What is the frequency of this wave ? HINT: It repeats twice in 10 msec

11. 200 Hz! (2 cycles in .01 sec = 200 cps) Answer:

12. PHYSICAL Fundamental frequency (F0)  Amplitude/ Intensity  Duration  PERCEPTUAL “Pitch” “Loudness” “Length” Physical vs. perceptual

13. Speech is here Image from Fetal Hydrocephalus. The Amazing Owen. “Great News from the Audiologist.” March 23, 2009. Accessed June 13, 2016. http://fetalhydrocephalus.com/hydro/SIblog/default.aspx?id=35&t=Great-news-from-the-Audiologist

14. Complex periodic waves • Results from imperfectly oscillating bodies • Demonstrate simple harmonic motion • Examples - a vibrating string, the vocal folds

15. Frequency – Tones/ Adding

16. Another example….. "http://www.askamathematician.com/wpcontent/uploads/2012/09/IndykKatabiPriceHassanieh.jpg">

17. Waveforms - Male Vowels

18. Waveforms - Female Vowels

19. Complex periodic waves – cont’d • Consists of a fundamental (F0) and harmonics • Harmonics (“overtones”) consist of energy at integer multiples of the fundamental (x2, x3, x4 etc…)

20. Harmonic series • Imagine you pluck a guitar string and could look at it with a really precise strobe light • Here is what its vibration will look like

21. From complex wave to its components… and the frequency spectrum • Also known as a “line spectrum” • Here, complex wave at the bottom… • ..is broken into its component sin waves shown at the top (complex wave)

22. 1768-1830 Fourier analysis Complex wave  component sinusoids Sound Light

23. Simple waves are a good way to learn about basic properties of frequency, amplitude, and phase. Examples include whistling; not really found much in speech Complex waves are found in nature for oscillating bodies that show simple harmonic motion (e.g., the vocal folds) Review of source characteristics Information from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Making Waves: An Overview of Sound.” 2013.

24. Now let’s look at the filter • In speech, the filter is the supralaryngealvocaltract (SLVT) • The shape of the oral/pharyngeal cavity determines vowel quality • SLVT shape is chiefly determined by tongue movement, but lips, velum and (indirectly) jaw also play a role

25. Resonance • Reinforcement or shaping of frequencies as a function of the boundary conditions through which sound is passed • FUN: Try producing a vowel with a paper towel roll placed over your mouth! • The ‘extra tube’ changes the resonance properties

26. Resonance / Formants • The SLVT can be modeled as a kind of bottle with different shapes… as sound passes through this chamber it achieves different sound qualities • The resonant peaks of speech that relate to vowel quality are called formants. • Thus, R1 = F1 (“first formant). R2 = F2 (“second formant”) etc. • F1 and F2 are critical determinants of vowel quality

27. Input  SLVT  final output

28. Vocal tract shape  formant frequencies

29. Resonance – FOUR basic rules • F1 rule – inversely related to jaw height. As the jaw goes down, F1 goes up, etc. • F2 rule – directly related to tongue fronting. As the tongue moves forward, F2 increases. • F3 rule – F3 drops with r-coloring • Lip rounding rule – All formants are lowered by liprounding (because lip protrusion lengthens the vocal tract ‘tube’)

30. Examples of resonance for /i/, /ɑ/, /u/ /i/ /ɑ/ /u/ • /i/ is made with the tongue high (thus, low F1) and fronted (high F2) • /ɑ/ is made with the tongue low (high F1) and back (low F2) Download a (free) cool, interactive demo: https://www.phon.ucl.ac.uk/resource/vtdemo/

31. American English Vowels (Assmann & Katz, 2000) Tables from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Making Waves: An Overview of Sound.” 2013.

32. F2 x F1 plot American English Vowels • Peterson & Barney, 1952 Figure from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Making Waves: An Overview of Sound.” 2013.

33. Chap 13 • Reading a sound spectrogram

34. The sound spectrograph • Invented in the 1940s • First called ‘visible speech’ • Originally thought to produce a “speech fingerprint” (?) • We now know speech perception is far more complicated and ambiguous..

35. Basics of spectrogram operation • Original systems used bandpass filters • Accumulated energy was represented by a dark image burned onto specially-treated paper • Nowadays, performed digitally using variety of algorithms (e.g., LPC = linear predictive coding)

36. Relating line spectrum to spectrogram ~ “video” ~“snapshot” F3 F1 1

37. Sample of word “spectrogram” • Pg. 192 Figure from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Reading a Sound Spectrogram.” 2013.

38. Vowel basics • Here is /i ɑ i ɑ / produced with level pitch F2 F1 Voice bar Spectrogram from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

39. Let’s find some vowels! Figure from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Reading a Sound Spectrogram.” 2013.

40. Here they are: Figure from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Reading a Sound Spectrogram.” 2013.

41. Consonants – formant transitions • An example of an F1 transition for the syllable /da/ Figure from Phonetics for Dummies. William F. Katz. “Reading a Sound Spectrogram.” 2013.

42. American English vowels in /b_d/ context • TOP ROW (front vowels): “bead bid bade bed bad” • BOTTOM ROW (back vowels) “bod bawd bode buhd booed” Spectrograms from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

43. Stops/ formant transitions • Spectrograms of “bab” “dad” and “gag” • Labials – F2 point down, alveolars F2 point to ~1700-1800 Hz, velars “pinch” F2 and F3 together • Note: bottom-most fuzzy is the voice bar! Spectrogram from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

44. Voicing (voice of WK)

45. Fricatives • Top row: /f/, theta, s, esh, • Bottom row: /v/, ethe, z, long z • Distribution of the spectral noise is the key here! Spectrogram from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

46. The fricative /h/ • Commonly excites all the formant cavities • May look slightly different in varying vowel contexts Spectrogram from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

47. Nasal stops • Spectrograms of “dinner dimmer dinger” • Marked by “zeroes” or formant regions with little energy • Can also result in broadening of formant bandwidths (fuzzying the edges) Spectrogram from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

48. Approximants /ɹ/ - very low third formant, just above F2 /l/ - formants in the neighborhood of 250, 1200, and 2400 Hz; less apparent in final position. Higher formants considerable reduced in intensity Spectrogram from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

49. Stops versus tap/flap “a toe” “a doe” “otto” • For full stops, there is about 100 ms of silence • For tap, only about 10-30 ms Spectrogram from Ladefoged and Johnson, A course in phonetics

50. Pseudo-colored example • Here is an American English /æ/ (male) • “Hot” areas (in green/yellow/red) have more energy Wavesurfer